HABITAT OF THE PARROT TRIBE. 9 
slate-coloured down. It was six months before they acquired 
then* proper plumage, and a year before they attained full 
growth. It was found much easier to breed from these clirna- 
tized birds than from then* parents. 
The parrot family is a very extensive one, and is scattered 
all over Asia, Africa, and America. There are, however, other 
parts of the world besides Europe that are non-productive of 
parrots. The northern and central regions of Asia, Greenland, 
Iceland, and the northern parts of America do not afford a 
home to the brilliant psittacidte. 
Brazil, Guiana, and America, contain the greatest variety of 
parrots, and to these regions the macaws are exclusively con- 
fined. Parrakeets likewise abound in Africa, from Senegal to 
the forests near to the Cape of Good Hope.* The common 
green parrakeet is found chiefly in the Straits of Magellan. In 
Asia, parrots are found in Hindostan and its dependent islands ; 
in Cochin China, in China, and the Eastern Archipelago. Lories 
are found only in the Philippine Islands and in Hew Guinea. 
Cockatoos are confined to the Eastern Archipelago and Aus- 
tralia, but in much greater abundance in the latter country 
than in the former. 
In its wild state, the food of the parrot Consists chiefly of 
fruits and berries ; but it is asserted by some authors, that a 
few of the tribes live on roots and succulent herbs. The way 
that a parrot extracts the kernel from an almond or other nut 
is interesting. Taking it in its beak, it fixes it on the under 
wrinkled surface of the upper mandible ; then, with the tongue, 
it is turned round and round till in a proper position to admit 
of the insertion of the chisel-like edge of the lower mandible, 
when the shell is split with the greatest ease, the husk rejected, 
and the nut swallowed. 
Marshy ground, and the borders of streams and rivers, are 
the favourite abiding places of the parrot tribe. It is not, 
however, because they need frequently to drink that such 
localities are selected ; on the contrary, wild parrots, as well as 
tame ones, drink very little. Instinct teaches the parrot that 
eating and drinking are not the sole essentials to comfortable 
existence. Without his bath, the wild parrot would be a mi- 
serable bird; his body, sweating beneath its heavy covering, 
would breed little pestilent insects, and his gorgeous plumage 
become tarnished as the second-hand frippery one sees in the 
shops of theatrical clothiers ; or, not to go so far a-field for a 
simile, as tumbled, and touzled, and slatternly, as half the 
